dawn's knitting

October 30, 2010

Yarn: Austermann Inka, an alpaca/wool blend, from stash, just under 10 balls.

Needles: 4mm

Modifications: I knitted at a tighter tension, so the garment is more fitted (rather a bit too fitted, lol!) , but kept the length. Added waist shaping, decreasing 4 sts each side. I also decreased the armhole depth, making the body before armholes a bit longer. It's a simple modified drop shoulder, so I worked the sleeve top down.

The colour is more of a blue-red and darker than shown. We took them in a hurry - Mr C was about to go out, it had started to rain a bit and was very breezy. I'm wearing slippers, and haven't even brushed the hair! So best of five!

It's a great pattern, a real pleasure to knit. This is the eleventh garment for IntSweMoDo2010. I originally planned to get the final garment on the needles this monht, but have decided to wait until December, and have a whole month off garment knitting, This is the 23rd garment in two years!

October 26, 2010

It nearly didn't make it. It's knitted top down and when I was nearly at the bottom of the sleeves I tried it on, and it was just so tight! The acorns yoke was far too loose, sa the neckband just didn't pull it in enough, and hence the sleeves started a f ewinches lower down my arm than I wanted. I wasn't happy, left it alone for a week and went back to it this week. I've steamed it (to try to make it fit!) and reknitted the collar.

Pattern: Acorns in Twist Collective

Started: 21st September

Finished: 21sr October

Yarn: Elann's superwash Bamboo (which is really a bamboo wool blend)

Needles: 4mm

Modifications: Instead of knitting the front borders and neckband as one I knitted them separately (good job as I had to undo the collar and buttonhole band). Instead of the four rows of rev st st border I knitted a wider garter st border. I decreased many more stitches for the neckband too, my first go was far too wide. I can't remember how many now, but about 2-3 times more than the pattern stated. This has worked in pulling up the yoke, though you can see it's still a wider neckline, but absolutely fine, not dropping off the shoulders!

#

I asked Mr C to take a photo of the yoke ...

Not quite!

It's a challenging knit. Not difficult, but there's a chart and initially I was having to skip form chart to symbols to descriptions, until I got it. There's a few 'at the same time' which I missed (despite the warning at the beginning!).

October 24, 2010

It's Harriet, from A Fine Fleece. I've made some adjustments though. The designs in this book are worked with a lot of ease, a bit overiszed (but lovely) and the few I like are also worked at a relaxed tension too. I found some lovely red Austermann Inka in my stash last month, and decided to hunt for a pattern, rather than do what I normally do, which is to find a pattern I love and then allocate yarn to it.

The mods - I worked at a tighter tension so the garment is fitted rather than loose. The armhole is a modified drop shoulder, and Ive shortened the length, and thus the sleeve width at the top of the sleeve. I may have overdone this, but I can live with it - lesson learnt, I can cope with a longer armhole depth for this type of armhole.I've also added a bit of waist shaping.

It's a nice knit, simple enough to carry around but wiht the lace pattern it's not as boring as plain stocking stitch.

The colour is a bluer red, not this orange red. This was taken yesterday, with sleeve one in progress:

After knitting the sleeve it looked a bit short. I've cast off but left the yarn attached, in case I want to lengthen. I wanted to do the bands and seam as much as possible, to get a better idea fo the length.

And a close up of the pattern.

I've just picked up the stitches for the second sleeve, hope to work a bit on that today. That's another mod, it's so easy to knit sleeves top down with this sort of armhole.

This is the eleventh garment for IntSweMoDo2010! I can't quite believe it! I'm having a break next month, and think I might start the final garment for this challenge in December, I might even splash out and not use stash!

October 21, 2010

It's a top down cardigan. The acorns pattern on the yoke pulls up and needed a steaming to open up (so I had an idea of body and sleeve length). Once I'd finished the body I opted to knit the borders (again, my reasoning is that I can try it on properly and see how it fits). I didn't like the edgings as given in the pattern, which were worked in one go, with the buttonholes being formed on the actual pick up and knit row, by missing out a few stitches, and was just four or so rows of reverse st st. I knew as soon as I had knitted the first few rows that I would never be able to easily button up, I'd have to hunt for those buttonholes! So I did separate borders, wider, in garter stitch, then the neckband, where I decreased double the amount of stitches required; I could already see that the neckline was very wide!

I tried it on last week. Too snug in body and sleeves, and too loose on the yoke! Because the yoke is wide and loose, the sleeves start lower down on my arm and look ridiculous. And, silly me, I'd put the top buttonhole too low down, didn't think that I had a neckband to do one in.

Taken last night in dim lighting.

There's just two things which will save this garment. I need to block it wider, and re-do the neckband, decreasing even more stitches. This should pull the neckline in, and up.

1) blocking. I've given it a steam to relax the wool/bamboo. Not sure how successful this is, though it feels wider.

Again, taken last night in dim lighting (it might have a bit of camera shake blurriness about it)

Not a proper steaming, I was avoiding the plastic bits like stitch markers and needle cables.

2) frog collar and buttonhole band, knit new buttonhole band and new, narrower, collar. Another slight improvement, it pulls the yoke up a little.

Then the sleeves, just an inch to knit and then the cuff acorn pattern. Done this morning!

It needs a proper steaming, and all those ends darned in, but I'm onto the home stretch now! It is still rather snug (that's down to me putting on a few pounds and the tension being a little out) but I'm pleased that I picked it up again. I don't like wips lying around. This will be garment '10 for IntSweMoDo2010.

I've a day off work today, and am going to spend the rest of the day kjnitting on my next garment, which is Harriet, from a Fine Fleece. Back, one front and half the next front are done already! It's a super easy lace pattern, and it knits up fast. My plan is to finish this front, join them and see how long I want the sleeves. I may do top down, as the sleeves are modified drop shoulder ones. Or may not ,,, stay tuned. Eleventh garment! Next month will be an accesories month (as I intend to blog every day, yikes) so it will be great to get this one finished as well and have a break from garment and shawl knitting.

October 14, 2010

Now that I've caught up it's much more fun knitting each clue, and it only takes a few evenings.

This one was fairly simple, though adding beads slows the progress right do.. Pity I can't capture the beads on the photo, they add sparkle!

What's also not apparent it that these are mini diamonds, the beads are in the centre of each diamond. Hope it blocks out!

The stole so far:

Finishing this month's clue so early meant that I only had the Acorns cardigan on the needles (well some secret socks for Mr C, which I can't knit in front of him), so I've cast on the next garment, in an alpaca/wool blend. It's early days, will blog a bit about this later when it's a definite wip.

October 11, 2010

I kept the top of the hexagons at the top and bottom, and worked half hexagons on the side to fill the gaps. Not really obvious from my photos, so there's a ripple edge and a straight edge.

A lot of the yarn was already in stash (and the colours discontinued!) but I did buy some new colours this summer, and Jill gave me some green, orange and blue. I have to say that the colour palette is pretty dismal and washed out this year - shouldn't cottons be bright???!

I weighed one hexagon and it's about 10g, Edging took about 70g, so that's a total of (very) approximately 1200g of yarn. It's a smallish blanket, measures 50x60"

The first bit of crochet I've done in ages. There's quiet a few mistakes but I've left them in, it's for us and dthe overall effect is great!

October 09, 2010

I'm knitting this from stash, it's Elann's superwash bamboo, which is actually a wool bamboo mix, Very nice to knit with, but very splitty, not great when I'm knittig the acorns pattern.

I'm hoping it will block out!!

It's a top down yoked cardigan. In this photo I've divided for the sleeves and am winging my way down the body. It's fairly easy knitting now, and my mind is already wandering to the next garment, which will be number eleven, the penultimate one!

October 07, 2010

Yes, five years in the making! I found this UFO when stash diving for the next garment. All intact, Back, front and half a sleeve completed, Needles still in knitting and photocopied instructions with notes written on them! I had copied the pattern from my Rowan magazine and then sellotaped them together - the sellotape had gone all yellow and lost its stickiness!

The cardigan is a bit too short for me, but will be fine for cool summer days.

The problem with having someone take your photo is that they don't tell you if it's a bit rumpled at the bottom ...

I do like knitting with 3ply cotton, pity it's discontinued. I have about 20 odd balls though, so I could knit a striped cardigan!

This is the ninth garment for IntSweMoDo2010! Can't believe I have managed this - but how come my yarn stash looks the same?

October 05, 2010

Pattern: loosely based on Nancy Bush's Gentleman's socks in Vintage Socks. I changed the heel to a heel flap and gusset.

Started: 20th September

Finished: 29th Septtember.

Yarn: No idea, probably Socka in an airforce blue.

It was a bit of a rush finsihing these off, Mr C infomred me that they needed to be finished by Wednesday - on the previous Friday evening, when I'd only knitted the leg of sock #1! Bear in mind that I work, and had something on on Tuesday evening!

I took them into work to post and my (old) camera took one photo and packed upx, so the other is from my mobile phone.

This is probably closer to the true colour :

This is with the camera - rather sunny and the colour is so washed out but you can see the pattern.

All this rushing around to finish them has put me off deadlines, so I have already cast on Mr C's birthday socks (not untill December).

October 03, 2010

A lovely pattern, written by Nancy Bush. It's knitted bottom up, so initially there's a lot of stitches, but I just LOVE knitting bottom up scarves, love the idea that the rows are getting shorter and the length is growing faster.

It's a simple lace patterned edging, then a repeating central panel.

We had several attempts at taking photos. The wind gusted, every single time we brought the camera out!